For many of us, music is a big part of everyday life. Music can both sooth and excite. It is proven that music can assist our memory. It clearly interacts with our brains in a special way.
When we think about Heaven musically, probably the first thing you think of is the harp. It is definitely a big part of our cultural picture of Heaven. I once had a church member who was hospitalized and close to death. Our local hospital had a woman who would go to patients’ rooms to play the harp because it was so soothing. As this woman entered the room of my member, she asked, “Would you like to hear some harp music?” This feisty old lady replied, “No, honey, I’ll be hearing plenty of that soon enough.”
But will she? Harps are mentioned in Revelation 5 and 15, but it is important to remember that all of the pictures of Heaven found in the Bible are visions, not field trips. The big difference is that a vision can have symbolic elements to it, similar to our dreams. They can also be simplified so that we can relate to what was seen. Harps were the possessions of the wealthy in the time of the Bible. They represented having leisure. That may be all the harp represents in Revelation.
The Bible, especially Revelation, does speak of singing in Heaven. Including the phrase “new song”. Those who have had out of body experiences of Heaven often also mention the music, and how captivating it is. Expect heavenly music to be a musical genre that is truly something new to you. Something hard to describe and never before experienced. If you don’t care for harp music or even hymns, don’t let that darken your mental image of Heaven. The desire to praise God and to do it with song will be as natural to you as breathing is now.
afterdeathsite 